


drowning

by kr4k3n



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Feels, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Memory Loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:13:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29597433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kr4k3n/pseuds/kr4k3n
Summary: karl forgets.
Relationships: Alexis | Quackity/Karl Jacobs/Sapnap, Karl Jacobs/Sapnap
Comments: 10
Kudos: 152





	drowning

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lovely404](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovely404/gifts).



Karl wakes up underneath a mushroom, surrounded by little flowers. Lilacs and tulips and red roses. His legs feel weak and his hands struggle to push himself to his feet. But he remembers this place. He’s in the library, part of his new country, one so young it’s just been named. 

It’s a relief to remember. Time blends easier these days, the smoky grays of the L’Manburg explosion and the deep blues of Mizu seeming so similar as Karl desperately wades through them, trying to separate them in his mind. It’s getting so much harder. 

Sometimes he feels himself sinking into his memories, deep into the caverns below the city in the sea. He’ll take a breath and his lungs fill with water, and when he sputters to clear them, he’s only pushed deeper underneath.

“Karl!” A voice, from in front of him. 

He blinks and staggers to his feet. 

“Woah, you good?” The man in front of him is smiling a little warily. He has dark hair, long enough that it’s pulled back from his face, and blue eyes. 

After a few moments of silence, Karl realized he should probably say something to the strange man who knows his name. “Yes, yeah—thanks,” he flashes him a grin, but it doesn’t satisfy anything. If anything, it deepens the confusion on the man’s face. 

“Okay just… don’t scare us like that again.” the man sighs, steps closer to him, “we were worried. Thought you’d ran off or something.”

Karl pauses. Is he supposed to remember who this is? Bile rises in his stomach as he remembers the warnings—that his memories will begin to slip through his fingers. But he couldn’t have forgotten anything yet. He would have remembered forgetting. He would have remembered forgetting his friends. 

“Who are you?” he questions, and he watches as the man’s expression turns from confused to amused. 

“Did George put you up to this, sugar?” Karl winces at the pet name, said so easily, like the stranger has had practice calling him it. “I’ll tell him I fell for it, don’t worry. Just come back with me. Quackity’s so worried. You know how he gets after Schlatt.” He reaches out a hand, as if to grab Karl’s, but Karl doesn’t budge.

The names are so unfamiliar, like he’s trying to listen to a forgein language. George, Quackity, Schlatt. It’s like his mind wants to connect them to faces, people, but can’t. Of course he can’t. They’re strangers. Not his friends. Karl wouldn’t forget his friends. 

“I don’t-” Anger surges up, suddenly, and he knows it’s not rational, but it rises inside him like the tide. “I don’t know who- who any of those people are, so if you’re playing some sort of sick joke on me then it’s not funny. I haven’t forgotten anyone. I remember.”

“What-” the man has a sort of astonished smile on his face, like he can’t quite believe what Karl’s saying. “What do you mean? Of course you haven’t forgotten us. Me.” 

Karl stumbles back, his back pressing against the giant mushroom. “I never knew you. I don’t know who you are,” he raises his voice, “I haven’t forgotten!” The man goes quiet and a little pale.

“I’m…” he says, carefully, “I’m Sapnap,” he points to his chest, like Karl can’t understand what he’s saying. “It’s me.”

“Who-”

“Karl, if you’re messing with me it’s not-”

Karl speaks at the same time, “If you’re kidding me I don’t think it’s very-”

Silence. 

Instead of trying to say something else, Sapnap steps forward, until he’s standing an arm’s length away. He reaches out and cups Karl’s cheek in one hand. He knows he should flinch away from the touch, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t.

Sapnap guides Karl’s face until their eyes meet, and a small gasp escapes his lips as they do. His gaze flicks across Karl’s face, and it’s like he’s seeing it for the first time—of course he’s seeing it for the first time—seeing the blankness in Karl’s eyes, the lack of recognition. 

“Who am I?” It’s Sapnap who speaks, softly, and it takes Karl a few moments to realize it’s not rhetorical, and he wants a response. 

“I don’t know, I just- I just met you!” Karl exclaims. 

“No-” Sapnap pauses, hand slipping off Karl’s face to his side, and takes a breath. “No. I’m Sapnap, I’m your fiance-”

Karl’s heart drops into his stomach. There’s no way he forgot his fiance. He doesn’t have a fiance. He has memories of a dozen different adventures over a dozen different timelines, but he doesn’t have memories of a fiance. 

“I wouldn’t have forgotten a fiance,” he says, simply. But it’s beginning to sound desperate, even to him. The anger deflates, and the fear surges in its place. “Did I forget?” He asks, and his voice sounds small. 

“Why would you forget?” Sapnap asks, distressed. Between two fingers, he’s rubbing a ring that’s strung onto a necklace, next to an almost identical one. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Karl shouldn’t trust a stranger enough to tell them about the time traveling. Why does he want to? 

“For god's sake-” Sapnap huffs. He tugs at the necklace so hard that it bites into his skin, leaving behind red marks. “So you don’t-” his voice cracks a little, “you don’t remember anything about me?”  
Karl shakes his head. 

Sapnap seems to deflate—both of them do. They’ve lost their anger. 

“We sat under the stars, one night,” Sapnap starts, tentatively. “You can see them better out here, far away from the L’Manberg ruins. You pointed out some constellations, and we talked for hours. About Dream—” at the name, Karl flinches, and he doesn’t know why, “—about L’Manberg, about how far we’d come. I could tell you were holding something back. I didn’t ask.” 

Karl leans against the mushroom, sliding down until he’s sitting under its cap. Sapnap sits, too, across from him. 

Karl can’t meet his eyes, so he focuses on the glowing light of the barn in the distance. “I can’t tell you why I’ve forgotten. I’m sorry. But I’ll fix this, I promise I will. I still,” he takes a breath, and it’s shaky. “I still love you. I don’t know why, or when it started. I can’t remember anything about you. But when I look at you, my chest goes all warm, and I’m happy, and I want to-” he cuts himself off as he looks into Sapnap’s eyes. There’s so much sadness there, and something tells him it runs deeper than him. 

He tries to continue, but his throat catches, and oh god, he’s crying. Tears roll down his face as he desperately tries to wipe them away with his hoodie. He sniffles, feeling pathetic in front of this stranger- fiance?

He looks at Sapnap through the blur of his tears, and he looks like he’s in just as much pain as Karl is in. He watches as Sapnap shuffles closer to him, a little awkwardly. He reaches his arms out, and, instinctively, Karl leans into them. At this, he only cries harder, but it feels… better, somehow. Safer. 

Sapnap holds him tight underneath the mushroom as he cries. Sapnap doesn’t know why Karl’s forgotten, and Karl doesn’t know who Sapnap is, but they can still find a sort of comfort together. Karl may be drowning, but, for now, Sapnap is keeping his head above water.

**Author's Note:**

> hope you karlnappers enjoyed your angst


End file.
